The Magic Lantern

Watership Down (Rosen, 1978) is, without a doubt, one of the pivotal cinematic experiences in my life. It captivated me at a very young age with its danger and darkness. It also taught me a number of valuable lessons, things I have thought about ever since. Fortune favoring the bold…

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Seven Samurai (Kurosawa, 1954) is truly a foundational film, not just of Japanese cinema, but of world cinema. Because it is has become a touchstone for so many tropes and devices that we recognize today, you might think that it is a stuffy film, or a hard slog because of…

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It’s that most wonderful time of the year again! In this episode, The Magic Jack O’Lantern 2021, we once again bring you our list of viewing tricks and treats to celebrate the season. We watched one Halloween inspired title every day in October and now pass the list and our…

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The Cole-o-ween festivities roll on here at Lantern HQ! This time around we are discussing one of our favorite underappreciated zombie classics, Let Sleeping Corpses Lie (Grau, 1974). This one has it all – beautiful locations, social commentary, hideous reanimated dead, and genuine scares. It acts as a bit of…

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Is there anything you find impossible to watch? Or how about just very difficult? For me, The Invisible Man (Whannell, 2020) is that film. I do have some personal history that makes what Cecelia is going through exceptionally poignant, but even without that sort of connection, I suspect a lot…

The post Episode 168 – The Invisible Man appeared first on The Magic Lantern.

Gray’s Anatomy (Soderbergh, 1996) is the last proper cinematic monologue we have from Spalding Gray. That’s a little ironic. Here, he navigates neuroses, a serious eye injury, and what he terms the Bermuda Triangle of health to come out the other side a little wiser, more experienced, and with his…

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Harlan County, USA (Kopple, 1976) is still a gut punch some fifty years later. Watching the violent and bloody events unfold as miners strike to be recognized for their union organization, for better wages and more safety measures, and simply to live by the end of their shift, their voices…

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Shadow of a Doubt (Hitchcock, 1943) was a turning point in the career of the master of suspense. It was reportedly Alfred Hitchcock’s favorite film he ever made. It is also what I consider to be his first truly American film. Once he looked into small town America’s heart of…

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Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (Hill, 1969) is a delight to watch time and again, a true piece of entertainment that seems to hit all the right notes. Surprisingly, the film was not an immediate hit with some critics or with directors like John Boorman who were confounded by…

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The Last Picture Show (Bogdanovich, 1971) will break your heart in a million different ways, all of them Texan. As an expatriate from a town very much like this, it hits me where I live. I’ve seen those fights on Main Street between guys who were best friends and will…

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